Hercules vs. Jell-o

Kevin Sorbo once played Hercules on a TV series where he got to punch people. Here, in Something Beneath(2007), he plays a wussy priest with obviously dyed hair and quotes ancient Indian scripture. Who needs to be punched now?

He’s attending a lecture on environmental issues at a new resort built on land that has no birds, frogs, snakes or stink beetles. What the land does have is a gelatinous sentient creature living in the ground, causing people to hallucinate their worst fears. (For me it’d be watching this movie ever again.) Throw in a cast of asshats — a diva b*tchsnob, a biologist with asthma, a straight cop with a crooked past, and Sorbo as a bible-licker with a roving eye for the resort’s supermodel PR rep — and you have an achingly wrong excuse for a sci-fi movie.

By the time they find the creature, it starts growing wiggly tentacles and is coming out of it’s dirt hole. The supermodel chick, hanging on for dear life over it’s mouth (or butt opening — like I can tell the difference) utters something in ancient Indian (which, as you recall, Sorbo happens to be fluent in), and causes the monster to retreat like me at a non-alcohol party.

Seems this language was a prayer asking the monster for forgiveness and that everyone is sorry for making it mad. The worse part is that it worked! That would’ve been the time for Sorbo to Herc up and start kicking blob. But no, he’s a wuss now and has no time for gladiator pants or punching things.